Fortunately, the group makes the collective (bar one) decision to use EddyTeddyFreddy as a steering pole.
Unfortunately, they’ve overlooked one crucial little detail: Cats hate getting wet. One or two of the would-be polers does escape with only minor scratches; the rest, however…
Fortunately, the always well-equipped norinew has a large first aid kit, and everyone gets patched up enough to stanch the blood flow before it’s too late.
Unfortunately, in all the confusion, the raft has drifted farther out into the current, and is now out of control. The adventurers hear a faint roar in the distance, which gets louder as they travel on down the river. Ahead they see looming headlands on either side of the narrowing torrent, and plumes of white spray mist the air between the forbidding, jagged rocks.
Fortunately, the raft is too wide for the narrowing torrent and scrapes to a gentle halt just moments before the cataract.
Unfortunately, the now jammed raft serves as a natural dam, and the level of water upstream begins to rise rapidly.
Fortunately, the ever resourceful norinew reaches into her Harpo-Marx-like knapsack, and pulls out a small boat motor powerful enough to hook onto the raft and push it away from the rocks. When asked why she didn’t pull it out before having to use ETF as a steering pole, she does her best (yet still sadly lacking) Roger Rabbit imitation, and says she could only do it “when it was funny”.
Unfortunately, norinew’s motor indeed frees the raft from the rocks – only to send it onward toward the lip of the cataract, which is now roaring so hugely that the adventurers have to shout to be barely heard. Just before the raft plummets over the waterfall to the stony fangs below, it catches on a tiny protrusion of rock.
Okay, gang – how do we get out of this one?
Fortunately, just as the boat catches onto the rock, the sky splits into two, lightning bolts crack across the sky, and time stops. The water freezes mid-fall and the adventurers are surrounded by a halo of light. As one, they look up into the face of God.
[“Don’t think you can get round me by existing!” shouts atheist Loneraven at the back]
Before the voice of the divine retreats and our intrepid adventurers get back to the serious business of falling down a waterfall, someone attempts to stall and ask for God’s autograph.
WHO SHALL I MAKE IT OUT TO?
They squabble for a time, and then finally agree to have it made out to all of them.
It is burnt into the rocky banks in golden letters a metre high.
YOURS IN DIVINITY,
CECIL ADAMS.
unfortunately out of nowhere Satan appears challenging Cecil to and all out war
THOU SHALL NOT PASS PHRED
(cue epic battle involving immense damage to all of the group)
Fortunately, while the battle rages, the hamsters knock off for a good meal and a nap. Our adventurers are suspended in mid-fall until the Perfect Master™ once again defeats his Evil Nemesis™ and restores the SDMB to harmony.
Unfortunately, the return of the hamsters to work has set the raft and all its occupants back into the thundering cascade.
Fortunately, the wheel powering this thread is now connected to a new hamster, whose slightly faster trot provides a sudden jolt of energy that kicks the raft out of the water and into a secret cave behind the curtain of the waterfall.
Unfortunately, they now find themselves on another, subterranian river. The current quickly sweeps them away from the waterfall and into the darkness. Fortunately, norinew has a battery-powered lantern in her bag.
After about an hour of drifting quietly, the group sees a strange sight: here, deep underground, is a man-made dock, and a lighted tunnel that leads away from the underground river. The groups unanimously decides to explore the tunnel, so they steer the raft over to the dock, and Diceman ties it up. Everyone then disembarks from the raft, but unfortunately Diceman’s knot-tying skills aren’t so great, and the raft drifts away downstream into the darkness.
Fortunately, norinew has an inflatable raft in her bag.
And also a Boy Scout Knot-Tying Guide for Diceman
Unfortunately, norinew’s inflatable raft has holes in it and it refuses to inflate. 1010011010 claims they look like claw marks, but ETF vigorously denies having sharpened her claws on anything. RCracer says “What about my knee as we went over the waterfall, huh? HUH???”
It’s looking like the start of an angry brawl, when fortunately BigDaiv pipes up and reminds the group that everyone was grabbing hold of whatever they could during the plunge toward what looked like certain death. Harmony restored, the adventurers decide to follow the lighted tunnel stretching away from the dock.
Fortunately, on their way towards the light source, the floating party come across a large chest enscribed ‘Boundless Pleasure™ shall be granted to those who return this chest unharmed to it’s owner.’
Unfortunately, despite being able to agree on their unanimous desire for Boundless Pleasure™, no one has a clue who the owner is. The locked chest itself gives no further information.
(meanwhile, atheists Loneraven & Gmork sit pensively at the back of the raft, struggling to re-define their beliefs so that they can take into account the existence of Cecil Adams.)
Fortunately, Gmork, who’s dozed off while the group debates what to do now that the raft is gone, wakes up from his dream of Boundless Pleasure™ in time to fall in with the rest of the group as they begin to walk down the lighted tunnel away from the dock.
Unfortunately, he and Loneraven must, even waking, still grapple with the problem for an atheist of the existence of our Perfect Master™, Cecil Adams. At least it gives them something to occupy their minds as the adventurers trudge along the featureless tunnel, wondering – not without some trepidation! – just where it will end.
Suddenly, norinew spots something on the wall of the tunnel. Fortunately (y’knew I had to get to the fortunately sometime, didn’t you?), norinew is the mother of a preschooler, and therefore recognizes the mark on the tunnel wall as a little blue pawprint. In other words, a clue. Maybe a clue about the identity of the owner of the chest! Unfortunately, not even norinew has a Handy Dandy Notebook in her bag, in which to draw the clue.
Fortunately, 1010011010 has a rather smart leather-bound notebook, in which the clue is artfully sketched by RCracer.
Meanwhile, Gmork, is busy calmly specifying her gender to ETF (lol).
Unfortunately, none of the group has any idea what the clue means, although they do all sign the paper with the newly drawn clue on it and hope to sell it on ebay as a collector’s editon.
The group continues along the tunnel. Shortly after the “clue,” the tunnel begins to slope gently upward. After a fairly long walk (about fifteen minutes), the tunnel comes to an abrupt end at a door. It’s an internal door, the type that you would use for your bedroom or bathroom. Fortunately, there is no lock on it. Unfortunately, there is a sign nailed to the door that reads, “All tresspassers will be eaten.”
Fortunately, many of the members of our motley crew enjoy this type of activity:D
Unfortunately, when certain members of the motley crew eagerly attempt to open the door, they discover it’s locked.
Fortunately, right next to it there’s another door. This one has a sign reading “Trespassers will be nuzzled in their naughty bits and slobbered on.” Gmork, who’s now clarified her gender with the equally transgenderish EddyTeddyFreddy, volunteers to go first. And the door is not locked!
Yes, I know Diceman said there was no lock on the first door. Unfortunately, he was mistaken. Fortunately, ETF discovered his error in time to keep him from hurting himself trying to wrench the door open.